In 1903 black leader and intellectual W.E.B. Du Bois wrote an essay in his collection The Souls of Black Folk with the title “Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others.” Both Washington and Du Bois were leaders of the black community in the 19th and 20th century, even though they both wanted to see the same outcome for black Americans, they disagreed on strategies to help achieve black social and economic progress. History shows that W.E.B Du Bois was correct in racial equality would only be achieved through politics and higher education of the African American youth. Throughout his essay, Du Bois challenged Booker T. Washington’s policy of racial accommodation and gradualism. In this article Du Bois discusses many issues he believes he sees …show more content…
Washington 's programme naturally takes an economic cast” (Du Bois). Du Bois believed that Washington’s theory was a gospel of Work and Money that ultimately overshadowed the higher aims of life” Later he makes another statement so powerful that should have made all African Americans want to stand up and fight for a better social status and rights for both the South and North. He goes on stating “The growing spirit of kindliness and reconciliation between the North and South after the frightful differences of a generation ago ought to be a source of deep congratulation to all, and especially to those whose mistreatment caused the war; but if that reconciliation is to be marked by the industrial slavery and civic death of those same black men, with permanent legislation into a position of inferiority, then those black men, if they are really men, are called upon by every consideration of patriotism and loyalty to oppose such a course by all civilized methods, even though such opposition involves disagreement with Mr. Booker T. Washington.” (Du …show more content…
While trying to help make life easier for African Americans in the south, Washington also tried to ease the fears of the whites on blacks wanting to integrate socially. Even though Du Bois understood the importance of the speech, he felt Washington was asking’s blacks to give up pushing and wanting equality in education for their youth and civil rights, which he felt were the exact things that they needed to be trying to
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois are two incredibly famous civil rights activists in United States history. Although they both sought to uplift blacks socially and economically across the country, they clashed over the best strategy for doing so. Coming from vastly different backgrounds, it’s understandable as to why they disagreed. However, as is evident by our current societal problems, Du Bois was the one who had the correct plan. That doesn’t mean that Washington’s ideas were wrong, but they were a temporary solution to a permanent and systematic problem.
After the Civil War, African Americans encountered great discrimination and suffering. During this era, two influential leaders emerged from different philosophical camps. Brooker T. Washington of Virginia and William Edward Burghardt Dubois of Massachusetts proposed, different means to improve African Americans’ conditions. These men had a common goal: to enrich the black community. However, the methods they advocated to reach these goals significantly differed.
When it all comes down to it, one of the greatest intellectual battles U.S. history was the legendary disagreement between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois. This intellectual debate sparked the interest of the Northerners as well as the racist whites that occupied the south. This debate was simply about how the blacks, who just gained freedom from slavery, should exist in America with the white majority. Even though Washington and DuBois stood on opposite sides of the fence they both agreed on one thing, that it was a time for a change in the treatment of African Americans. I chose his topic to write about because I strongly agree with both of the men’s ideas but there is some things about their views that I don’t agree with. Their ideas and views are the things that will be addressed in this essay.
Booker T. Washington was an African American leader who established an African-American college in 1181. Then in 1895 delivered the Atlanta Compromise Speech to an audience of mainly Southerners, but some Northerners were present. In his speech he made a few points. He said, “No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.” Washington believed that the African American race needed to learn first that manual labor was just as important as the work of intellects. He thought that until they learned this they were not worthy of becoming intellects themselves. The color line is thus important in teaching them this lesson. He also said, “It is important and right that all privileges of the law be ours, but it is vastly more important that we be prepared for the exercise of these privileges.” His opinion was that one day blacks would deserve to have equal rights with the whites, but right now in 1895 the blacks needed to be...
When talking about the history of African-Americans at the turn of the twentieth century, two notable names cannot be left out; Booker T. Washington and W.E.B Du Bois. They were both African-American leaders in the late 1800’s to early 1900’s, fighting for social justice, education and civil rights for slaves, and both stressed education. This was a time when blacks were segregated and discriminated against. Both these men had a vision to free blacks from this oppression. While they came from different backgrounds, Washington coming from a plantation in Virginia where he was a slave, and Du Bois coming from a free home in Massachusetts, they both experienced the heavy oppression blacks were under in this Post-Civil War society. Booker T. Washington and W.E.B Du Bois were both pioneers in striving to obtain equality for blacks, yet their ways of achieving this equality were completely different. W.E.B Du Bois is the more celebrated figure today since he had the better method because it didn’t give the whites any power, and his method was intended to achieve a more noble goal than Washington’s.
Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. DuBoise. Booker T. Washington believed that blacks should not push to attain equal civil and political rights with whites. That it was best to concentrate on improving their economic skills and the quality of their character. The burden of improvement rests squarely on the shoulders of the black man.
The differences of their philosophies were clearly shown in their writings—Booker T. Washington’s “Up from slavery” and Du Bois’s “The Souls of Black Folk”. Before we analyze the similarities and differences of both of the leaders, we have to look at their early life experiences as it can be an important factor on how and where they get their inspiration for their philosophies. Booker T. Washington was an influential leader during his time and a philosopher that always addressed the philosophy of self-help, racial unity and accommodation. He had preached and urged all the black people to simply accept the discrimination that they got and asked them to work hard to gain material prosperity (Painter 169). In his
W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington were two very influential leaders in the black community during the late 19th century, early 20th century. However, they both had different views on improvement of social and economic standing for blacks. Booker T. Washington, an ex-slave, put into practice his educational ideas at Tuskegee, which opened in 1881. Washington stressed patience, manual training, and hard work. He believed that blacks should go to school, learn skills, and work their way up the ladder. Washington also urged blacks to accept racial discrimination for the time being, and once they worked their way up, they would gain the respect of whites and be fully accepted as citizens. W.E.B. Du Bois on the other hand, wanted a more aggressive strategy. He studied at Fisk University in Tennessee and the University of Berlin before he went on to study at Harvard. He then took a low paying research job at the University of Pennsylvania, using a new discipline of sociology which emphasized factual observation in the field to study the condition of blacks. The first study of the effect of urban life on blacks, it cited a wealth of statistics, all suggesting that crime in the ward stemmed not from inborn degeneracy but from the environment in which blacks lived. Change the environment, and people would change too; education was a good way to go about it. The different strategies offered by W.E.B. Du Bois and Booker T. Washington in dealing with the problems of poverty and discrimination faced by Black Americans were education, developing economic skills, and insisting on things continually such as the right to vote. ...
When Booker T. Washington speeches the Atlanta Compromise, it is still a big step to talk about equality and social problems of the white and black races, even though it is after the Civil War. However, it is necessary to agitate to reach complete liberty and social change ultimately, which address Washington to have an oblique approach to express the purpose of the speech. He announces his intention of the black race, simultaneously, he wants to make the Southern white men feel relief and relaxed about talking about it. It supports the reason he speaks meek and polite all the time, not to offend the white audience. He insists that the importance of having a business is greater than getting a social equal for African-Americans, which makes
Lewis’s viewpoint is not without it’s truths. The Harlem renaissance was overseen by a number of intellectuals such as Booker T. Washington, Marcus Garvey, and W.E.B. Dubois. Booker T. Washington‘s, a highly influential speaker of the age, words appealed to both Caucasians and African-Americans. Washington forged an interracial bridge of communication through his unique tactics in the quest for equality. He believed in more subtle ways of gaining equality through hard work, cunning, and humility. He stated, “The wisest among my race understands that the agitation of questions of social equality is the extremist folly, and that progress in the enjoyment of all the privileges that will come to us must be the result of severe and constant struggle rather than of artificial forcing.”(Salley, 15) With this statement, Washington himself denies that this new awakening in equality and arts could be forced,...
Of the many truly inspirational speeches given by African Americans, Booker T. Washington’s The Atlanta Exposition Address is one of the few that intends to achieve compromise. In his speech, Washington is trying to persuade an audience composed significantly of white men to support African Americans by granting them jobs and presenting them with opportunities. His goal is to convince his white audience that African Americans will be supplied with jobs lower than those of white men, allowing white men always to be on top. Booker T. Washington’s The Atlanta Exposition Address adopts a tone of acquiescence and compromise to persuade a predominantly white audience to accept his terms.
For four years the country was split in half as brother fought brother in a bloody civil war that would become a defining moment in America’s short history. The abolishment of slavery dawned a reconstruction movement that would be anything but easy. As millions of African Americans fought for social, political, and economic equality they were met head on by a mass who wished the status quo and the continued suppression of newly freed slaves. This new movement, like all movements, would inevitably have it’s leaders, two of which being Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois. It is the differences in both ideology and approach that separates these two men and their respective camps in the fight for equality.
Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois had different deeds to deal with racial discrimination but W.E.B. Du Bois is the African-American leader’s philosophy I most agree with. He was the first African American that graduated from Harvard University in 1895 and was the author of famous The Souls of Black Folk. From the mid 1910’s, a program of political struggle for equal rights of ethnic raised in African-American communities, especially the emergence of the middle class, the historian, sociologist W.E.B Du Bois was the first one who started this program. Until 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which was founded by Du Bois was established.
Washington stated many times that people must try and work for what they have because nothing will just come to anyone. Likewise, Washington explains, “Nothing ever comes to anyone, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work”(Washington 131). Because of what Washington did, many Negroes became educated. Also, helping with the school in Tuskegee showed Washington’s commitment to education and work. DuBois believed in the right to vote, civil equality, and the education of the Negroes based on their abilities (Gibson 3). Controversially, Washington believed that no matter what the Negroes’ abilities were, they should not be denied an education. By being respected by both races, Washington brooke the racial boundaries of the
W.E.B. Du Bois’ political views were that he was once a leader of the opposing side of the early civil rights movement. DuBois was born free and had a lot of educational opportunities that Booker T. Washington did not have. “Du Bois felt that Booker T. Washington’s plan to gain equality was only going to broaden and aggravate the cruelty of African-American’s in the United States and more specially in the South.” Rather choosing a plan of accommodation, Du Bois would rather favor a plan with political action. DuBois believed that African Americans had to speak clear on the weaknesses that they were held to in the United States. DuBois had very specific ideas of what he thought the African American’s needed to achieve in order to gain equality.